What does a New colony need?

[WesleysDisciple]

am running a PBP LUG game thought id ask this here, as the questions probaly mainstream enough.

What supplies beyond medicine, Replicators, Seeds, and Farm Equipment will a new colony likely need.

Only thing I can think of replicators simply cant make are seeds.

Anything else?

 

[TerragonSix]

Specialists such as engineers, mechanics, doctors, merchants, etc.

 

[T'Girl]

A group of people wishing to relocate there, or alternately there would have to be a good reason to move to a undesireable place.

 

[Takeru]

Looking at colonies and the size of starships in the Star Trek universe, I always wondered why they don't take a hollow starship saucer, build a town inside it, add landing gear and plop it on a planet, cut the roof off and you're done, buildings, infrastructure, fusion reactors from the impulse engines, it's all there and the colonists has already time to move in and meet their new neighbors and colleagues, so when they reach their new home they don't have to start from scratch.

Sure, your entire city has a metal floor, but it's not hard to cut it open for parks or to let a river run through.

 

[WarpCore]

Seeds? One invasive animal species (humans) isn't enough so you're going to bring along seeds to potentially overrun and decimate the existing flora and ecosystem? Why would you bring farming equipment rather than just replicating tools? You need initial shelter, starter power sources, a few replicators, and anything biological. You initially use the replicators to build more power sources and more replicators and go from there.

If you're going to bring seeds for known safe plant life, might as well bring samples of chickens, pigs, cattle, etc.

I'd point you to DS9 4:22 For the Cause, TNG 2:18 Up the Long Ladder, and Genesis 6:19.

 

[T'Girl]

Of course you'll bring seed and likely animals too. People like familiar foods and replicators are known to crank out food that tastes "off."

No one is suggesting moving an intelligant species to the side, but replacing a regions native animals or plants? Yes please.

Growing flora and fauna does not require a powerful energy source, a replicator does. Animals naturally replace themselves and increase in numbers too.

The idea for landing the transport ship is a good idea, unless your intent is for it to make multiple trips bringing waves of colonists over time. The first wave prepares the site, creating roads, water reservoirs (hydro power maybe?), the first towns, etc.

Second and subsequent waves arrive at a measured pace, as the colony can absorb them.

 

[WarpCore]

If you want mostly non-replicated food, you'll definitely need bees. The Pilgrims did it.

 

[Storyteller]

A means to build and repair facilities such as habitats, a sickbay, greenhouses as appropriate, and a way to produce power to run things like the replicator and other machinery. Am curious: would an industrial-sized replicator be enough to produce the materials needed to build such facilities in the shapes and sizes needed? Where would the raw materials for the replicator come from, assuming that not enough power exists to do the E=MC2 thing to turn energy into matter?

 

[USS Triumphant]

Growing flora and fauna does not require a powerful energy source, a replicator does.

There's this big fusion reactor called "the sun" that is pretty heavily involved there - perhaps you've heard of it?

I can't see any reason why, just looking at the way the technology is supposed to work, you can't replicate seeds, food that tastes just like the original food it copies, or animals (including the sentient animal species like humans, Vulcans, etc, and without them being evil versions of them, either.) But I get that, story-wise, the limitation is generally there to prevent rampant copying of crewpeople and all sorts of other story elements that would probably just get out of hand for the kind of stories they want to tell.

So assuming that limit, I'd say you need:

1. colonists
2. a planet suitable for the colonists (probably but not necessarily M-class)
3. the parts for some manner of power producing tech (solar panels, fusion reactor, etc) suitable to power at least one industrial replicator IF you aren't planning on landing your colony ship(s) to use their reactor(s)
4. the parts for an industrial replicator IF you aren't planning on landing your colony ships and they have one or more onboard.
5. (semi-optional) Any specialized gear that may be too large to replicate needed to extract valuable resources (dilithium or latinum, for examples) from the planet.

You'll note that I'm STILL not including food stuffs in this list. It isn't that I don't think the colonists need food, obviously, but it seems to me that there are several ways of handling this, and not all of them require bringing anything with you.

1. Replicators. Okay, sure, the food produced may not be the greatest, but neither was the deer jerky and such that the Pilgrims survived on - and I've never heard anyone suggest that replicator food isn't *nutritious*, so suck it up, Princess.
2. As a *Federation* colony world (assuming you are), you can almost certainly just put yourself on a list for food cargo drops until you have made yourself self-sustaining. The Federation is wealthy enough in resources to do this, no problem.
3. Seeds and bees and animals (to produce fertilizer, even if you are against eating meat from living animals) from your native environment (or their analog from your world, there, Tholian ). But as I pointed out in 1 and 2 here, this isn't urgent.
4. Genetically modify *native* plants and animals to make them nutritionally compatible while keeping the planet as close to original as possible. This may also have the advantage of immediately providing you with a valuable export - the new variety of wine or cheese or whatever that can be made exclusively with your new resources will surely please the crap out of intergalactic wine and cheese (or whatever) snobs everywhere - and *of course* they will just be dying to have some that isn't replicated.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

In addition to things already mentioned, a communications system and a generator.

 

[USS Triumphant]

In addition to things already mentioned, a communications system and a generator.

Both can be replicated if they aren't also being scavenged from the colony ship. Replicators take care of a great deal. I guess I *could* see it, if the OP wants to for game purposes, if the type of generators the colonists would want to use were to require one of those rare unreplicatable materials, though - in which case a supply of that material would be needed.

 

[T'Girl]

Growing flora and fauna does not require a powerful energy source, a replicator does.

There's this big fusion reactor called "the sun" that is pretty heavily involved there - perhaps you've heard of it?

Collecting enough solar energy to run a replicator might require a fairly extensive array. The two large replicators on the Enterprise were powered by a antimatter reactor, and on at least one occasion the replicator require so much power the ship couldn't go to warp.

A limited output replicator might be powered by the sun, but a "full use" replicator might not reasonable be able too.

I can't see any reason why, just looking at the way the technology is supposed to work, you can't replicate seeds ...

As I understand it, a replicator can not produce living things, seeds (viable ones) are living things.

It would be like replicating a fertile chicken egg, and then having it hatch, the replicator just can't do it.

 

[GENERAL_DS]

You also need things to help boredom. What kind of things depends on how advanced your colony is going to be and how many people will be living there. For entertainment think in things like stadiums and there own music. Also, and this might be the most important thing to have on a colony, you need jobs. A colony that is very high tech will have less jobs that will be needed for the survival of te colony while low tech colonies (like a colony that will not have any kind of post steam technology) will have jobs like farmers.
All of the supplies you are going to need for these things cannot be brought in in one trip. These things need to turn up natural, In other words, the colony needs to develope its own culture and identity, and these things take time.

All these things are secondary, but if you want a self sustaning colony these are a must.

 

[USS Triumphant]

Growing flora and fauna does not require a powerful energy source, a replicator does.

There's this big fusion reactor called "the sun" that is pretty heavily involved there - perhaps you've heard of it?

Collecting enough solar energy to run a replicator might require a fairly extensive array.

I wasn't talking about running a replicator. I was talking about growing plants and animals - they get their power from the sun. It's called "being a smartass".

I can't see any reason why, just looking at the way the technology is supposed to work, you can't replicate seeds ...

As I understand it, a replicator can not produce living things, seeds (viable ones) are living things.

It would be like replicating a fertile chicken egg, and then having it hatch, the replicator just can't do it.

I believe I *did* go on to say that I understood that limitation IS there for *story* purposes. It just doesn't make sense based on what the technology is supposed to be capable of. Why are you quoting only selected parts of what I said so you can act like you are telling me things I don't know?

 

[USS Triumphant]

You also need things to help boredom. What kind of things depends on how advanced your colony is going to be and how many people will be living there. For entertainment think in things like stadiums and there own music. Also, and this might be the most important thing to have on a colony, you need jobs. A colony that is very high tech will have less jobs that will be needed for the survival of te colony while low tech colonies (like a colony that will not have any kind of post steam technology) will have jobs like farmers.
All of the supplies you are going to need for these things cannot be brought in in one trip. These things need to turn up natural, In other words, the colony needs to develope its own culture and identity, and these things take time.

All these things are secondary, but if you want a self sustaning colony these are a must.

Very true, but not an immediate need as you said - and a lot of what would be specifically required depends on the general purpose of the colony. Is it just a spreading-Federation-presence sort of colony where people expect to live more-or-less the same as they do elsewhere in the Federation? Or does it have some additional religious/governmental/scientific/etc agenda?

Come to think of it, *I* kind of assumed with my lists above that the colonists would want to maintain a modern lifestyle. But what if it is an Amish community, for example? Or hipsters?

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Solar energy can barely run modern technology, it certainly can't run a replicator. Presumably, a replicator's energy needs follow the E = MC^2 formula. So basically you'd need the energy yield of a nuke to so much as make breakfast.

I suppose perhaps there is a mode where you can de-materialize matter directly in the replicator and use that energy to replicate.

 

[T'Girl]

Why are you quoting only selected parts of what I said so you can act like you are telling me things I don't know?

Given that your post was only two positions above mine, reproducing the entirety of your post was completely unnecessary.

I actually have no idea as to what you don't know.

Come to think of it, *I* kind of assumed with my lists above that the colonists would want to maintain a modern lifestyle.

But what constitutes a "modern lifestyle?" From what we learned on the shows, only about half of personal homes include a replicator, it wasn't just Robert Picard's home that lacked one.

Joseph Sisko's restaurant served "real food." And the planet that Worf's adopting parent lived on (before moving to Earth) was described as a agricultural colony.

So basically you'd need the energy yield of a nuke to so much as make breakfast.

It's alway seemed to me that what your source material was would play a part in how much energy was required. If you wanted a thousand big steel bolts for construction, the replicator would need less power if you fed in iron ore as opposed to handfuls of dirt. The finished product wouldn't have to have it's density changed very much. It would still need a boat load of power, but somewhat less.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

So basically you'd need the energy yield of a nuke to so much as make breakfast.

It's alway seemed to me that what your source material was would play a part in how much energy was required. If you wanted a thousand big steel bolts for construction, the replicator would need less power if you fed in iron ore as opposed to handfuls of dirt. The finished product wouldn't have to have it's density changed very much. It would still need a boat load of power, but somewhat less.

And I would assume that the 24th century would do better than the 1/30 conversion rate that modern solar technology achieves, and that's before the possible energy achieved by disassembling protons themselves.

 

[desfem79]

to establish it, you need to vet planets of course, so most if not all UFP member world species can inhabit (,i.e. not too cold for Vulcans and warm for humans, or too humid for Andorians but perfect for Trill, etc.)

You'd need a plan of the colony like a map, and to identify potable water sources, minerals, even wildlife. provided there are no predators like that world's version of Amur tigers, then fine. You'd need to establish also a base power source. It seems there may be publicly-run fusion generators at hand that power everything, even home replicators. then you'd need a police force, housing, recreational facilities, etc.